Change Camber or not?
 

My 2013 427 Corvette went to the dealer this week for oil change. I always speak to the service tech after he completes work on my Corvette about any findings and observations. He asked me if I ever tracked my car or had plans to do so. When I asked why, he said the "high performance" Corvettes are set up with a more aggressive "Camber" setting. Better for track but causes greater front tire ware. He said a softer camber setting for street driving would get better front tire ware. My car is 6 years old and still has original tires. I am thinking the tires will dry rot before they ware out from aggressive camber. Anyone had this done? Good idea or not?

Are you comfortable with the way it drives? It still has the original tires, so obviously they are not wearing out. Why screw with it?

Sox-Fan,C6KWJ, Corvette drives fine. No longer mod my cars as I did back in the day and with this 60th Anniversary car I am reluctant to change anything factory. Still open to hear from anyone who has had this done but all things considered think I will leave well enough alone. Thanks!

How many miles are on these original tires? Just curious.

Bear in mind that the factory alignment specs have such a wide tolerance range, that you may not even have any negative camber at all. Or a couple of wheels could have negative camber, while the others are positive.

Excessive toe, not negative camber killed one of my tires.

Bottom line though, if your tires are wearing evenly across the entire tread surface and you have say 12,000 miles or more on your 6 year old car, then you probably don't need an alignment. If you have significantly more miles than that, you are doing very well on tread wear.

EVRGRN my car has such low miles on it as I said the tires will likely dry rot long before they ware out. I am 2nd owner. The original owner ordered this 4LT 427 car late 2012. He had put 2200 miles on the garage queen in 4 years when I bought it. At this point the car has less than 5K miles on it.

It wouldnt hurt to check alignment when you need a new set of tires. People usually recommend replacing them every 6-7 years and a lot of shops wont repair your tires at all. You do want some camber as it willl helpbin corners. As mentioned above toe settings being wrong will kill the tire quick. Of course with the rate you put miles on it the tires will most likely be replaced die to age not wear.

If you own a garage queen that gets so few miles per year that your tires are dry rotted before they have enough miles to wear out, I guess your alignment specs are not of any concern.

But, if you burn through tires at a higher rate than that ... setting your alignment Toe and Camber is very important.

If you don't "Track" your C6, and you want the best mileage out of your new set of replacement tires, I suggest the following:


Toe: As close to zero degrees on both front and rear as you can get them

Camber Front: -0.5 degrees

Camber Rear:. -0.3 degrees
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Anyway, something close to the above Camber settings will still make handling of the car under street driving conditions good ... but will assure long tire wear.

Up to you ...

Well, "Nice Ride" is a very appropriate username for a low-mileage 427 vert.

As Turbo6TA suggested, maybe just get a conservative alignment to the stated specs whenever you get a replacement set of tires (due to age).

Turbo you drive a Grand Sport correct? Those numbers if you run them are almost outside of GM's specs for that car. I have a '13 GS and will only set them to dead center. I get tremendous tire wear and handling but my specs set to dead center are way different than your specs.

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.cor...eb2e61986c.jpg

Yes, I have a 2011 GS

The numbers I posted may be conservative to the point of being almost out of spec for the GS and Z06, but my numbers will get you the best wear out of a set of tires.

Had my GS realigned to Pfadt street specs (after installing new Michelins) instead of stock factory GS specs. Did the same on my previous heavily-modded Z06. Noticed no difference in handling. Unless you track the car, and have more ability than 90% of owners, you'll benefit from the street settings.

Factory Tire Mileage Expectations
 

Hey Guys, don't mean to hijack the thread, but, came here to do some research & ran across this thread.

(I am normally in the C2 or C3 sections)

Soooo, looking at a C6, low mileage, approx 22k. And still has factory tires. Car is not tracked or modded. But just how many miles can one expect to get from the originals which would now be approaching 10 years old?
And what does a new set of factory matching tires cost if that's a near term expense?

Thanks much, and, mods feel free to move if I'm too far off topic.

TIA
PreviousOwner

Zero miles. It isn't the miles at that point, it is the age. Tires will harden over time, and become dangerous and slippery. At 10 years, they are likely extremely hard. Additionally, this hardening occurs both on the outside and inside of the tire, in sections of the tire that you cannot see. They should be immediately replaced, regardless of amount of tread. Budget $1k - $1200 for new tires. Go with MPSS.

I had to change my front tires at 14,000 miles they were the original Goodyears. The tread was worn down to the wire mesh on the inside of the tires. This was from the factory setting. They didnt show wear and when they did they went fast. My sevice tech put a less aggressive alignment on it and its been very satisfactory with my Michelines ps zp wearing evenly all around

Clif

Had an alignment done. The camber was at 1.3 now it is .5. Car used to be more like a go kart, which I kinda liked. Now it is not as go karty. Kinda made it boring to drive. The tire wear was not an issue before, I got 20,000 miles out of the Michelin zp a/s. You will notice the difference when driving.

Doing new tires soon because I am at the same wire mesh on the inside showing point since 16k mi. I'd like to keep the gokarty feeling too...but the wife is not happy with my spending $1k+ every 15-20k miles.

I have what's known around here as the Phat Street Alignment on my GS.

The "Pfadt" specs are now known as the "Phat" specs? :D

Fat specs if you prefer.:crazy: